Last night, I finally started stripping some of our door hardware. For some reason the previous owners thought it was a good idea to paint over everything. Knobs, plates, hinges, curtain brackets, screws, nails, etc.

It took me over an hour to clean off the first escutcheon plate. I used a butter knife and razor blade, but it was taking forever and no matter how careful I was, I kept scratching the metal. I Googled “how to remove paint from hardware” and This Old House came through for me. Turns out, all I needed was a crockpot and a couple drops of dish soap. Two hours later, the paint rubbed right off the plates. Awesome!